Saturday, 7 November 2015

I'm sure it won't have escaped your attention that the Coca-Cola lorry is visiting Llanelli. An overexcited, breathless press release announced that Council leader Emlyn Dole "has exclusively revealed that the iconic 38-tonne truck has been secured for a one day show-stopper in Llanelli town centre".

Whilst the event will no doubt bring a welcome, if brief, boost to town centre trade, those marketing geniuses at Coca-Cola have, somehow or other, not only made this illuminated truck an integral part of Christmas, and an "iconic" part at that, but have secured taxpayer funded advertising from councils across the UK in the run up to Christmas. Fair play to them.

However, it would be interesting to hear Cllr Dole's explanation as to how this all fits in with Plaid Cymru's pop tax policy (recently endorsed by the seemingly less than 'iconic' Jamie Oliver) and the council's own role in tackling childhood obesity...after all, their Annual Report tells us they have set up a "multi-agency, multi-disciplinary childhood obesity prevention group, which focuses on current environment, services and policies which addresses community based prevention for childhood obesity." (The writer has clearly overdosed on sugar)

Anyway, I'm no humbug and was disappointed to hear that despite finding a perfect match to play King Herod, casting for an iconic open air Council Nativity Play in the town centre was abandoned when no one was able to find three wise men...

2 comments:

Talking of Christmas, I was pondering what Mark James could buy as a stocking filler for his 74 buddies on the Council. I would suggest a book. It’s always a safe bet if you can think of nothing else. I know that 74 books is quite a hefty financial outlay, but just put it on the plastic Mark! I’m sure that you can rely on that £500,000 pay-off coming along sooner or later to clear the balance. The book I would recommend is: The Coke Machine - The Dirty Truth Behind the World’s Favourite Soft Drink, by Michael Blanding. In the book councillors will be able to read all about the story of Coca-Cola. Not just the corporation’s efforts to seduce children into guzzling ever more quantities of the sugary coloured water so that the obesity, diabetes and tooth decay statistics point ever upwards, but also other shenanigans. For example Coca-Cola’s activities, in countries such as Turkey and Columbia, in threatening and intimidating workers brave enough to attempt to set up trades unions; not just with cosy methods of lock outs and dismissals, but engaging the assistance of para-military groups and death squads. In India and Mexico the bottling plants of Coca-Cola have been accused of draining aquifers and polluted drinking water. Coca-Cola was a vociferous supporter of the murderous apartheid regime in South Africa; it has been involved in bully boy tactics with its suppliers to inflate its profits and deceive its shareholders, and so on. I won’t elaborate on the story further else to spoil a good read. Still, it is Christmas I suppose. Peace and goodwill to all corporations and all that!

'The Claimant is a housewife, mother and amateur blogger. The defendants are a council and a chief executive. It is literally state versus citizen. In a large part, the origins of the entire case derive from the issue of getting ones voice heard at all'

'In light of the evidence, the allegations of perverting the course of justice are unsustainable. This is the most serious allegation and the Claimant deserves to have her reputation vindicated...Mr Davies' evidence was incoherent, confused and contradicted [his] statements given at the time...in short, Mr Davies' evidence of what happened has completely changed and he cannot be relied on'

(From closing submission for the claimant at trial, February 2013)

...In August 2016, following a very belated (three years later) complaint to the police by Mark James that I perverted the course of justice, the investigation was dropped as there was no evidence.

There never was going to be any evidence as I told the truth, on oath, at the time.